One Last Time
by Phoenix Sworn
Summary: One-Shot. Harry has finally defeated Voldemort, but when the world has bought its peace with death, there is still one life left to pay.


Disclaimer: I own nothing.

A/N- this just showed up in my mind, and has no attachments to my other fics.

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Harry stood on the bank of a river, listening to the faint musical gurgle of water at his feet. It sang of remorse, of love, lust, loss, pain, betrayal, forgiveness, memory. It beckoned to him, a thousand times more alluring than the silky voices behind the veil.

His black robes were tattered and soaked with blood, both from him and from others. The dark fabric stuck to his skin, and caught on the wounds that marred his young body. On his hands layers of dirt and filth covered the skin drawing the eye up to the bloody nails beneath which the rusty brown of dried blood announced his crimes. There was even tangible death in his black hair. Viscera from both man and beast was splattered over his chest and shoes.

Is this what I am? Is this all that is left of me? Death? Pain? He took a breathe and looked to the stars above him. All I ever did was try to help. Save my friends when they needed it, support them…love them, and I all I have in return is this?

He looked back down at his disgusting body.

_Everyone I love I kill._

Slowly, his right arm rose, and he looked at the bracelet around it. It was his reminder, his list of everyone he was fighting for. There were ten charms around it; one for each.

_My parents._

There was a small locket that his mother had been given by his father, engraved with the word 'forever.' He had fought for them the longest, for the tiny breath of vengeance that had been with him since he was a child. It had always been a part of him.

_Sirius._

His godfather. Too much to handle.  It seemed to take Sirius an age to fall. His body curved in a graceful arc as he sank backward through the ragged veil hanging from the arch. "He's gone." So long ago. In the past, but still defining his present.

_Remus._

Sweet Remus who had fallen to make sure that Harry escaped, silver through the chest; the most painful way for a werewolf to die. He had done so much, prevented so many deaths by it, and nearly broke Harry by doing it all.

_Aunt Petunia._

She had come to pick him up from King's Cross, and had stepped in front of him, blocking the killing curse with her own life, and saving his. She had never even loved him.

_The Headmaster._

He had died at the hands of the Order's second traitor, Kingsley Shacklebolt, and had fallen rather than reveal Harry's location. Voldemort had been kind enough to gift Harry with the memory of the event. Albus' screams still echoed in his ears at night, begging but at the same time steely in their resolution to reveal nothing.

_The Weasleys._

All of those that were at the Burrow on that fateful night; everyone but Ron and Ginny. He had been told first, and had to hold them back as the beat at him, trying to reach and help their family, but Harry had known they were already lost. By the time he had been told it was almost an hour old. Fred and George had been found with their same smiles, somehow a greater act of defiance than any scowl. Bill found clutching a box that held Fleur's possible engagement ring. Charlie asleep in a chair. Molly and Arthur sitting across from Percy, who had never gotten to apologize. All killed for their attachments to him.

_Ginevra._

Little Ginny who had stayed up nights listening to his nightmares, helping him review, practicing duels, making sure he kept his mind when there was no reason to. She had stood up in the common room one day, walked through the portrait, down the steps of the school, and onto the Quidditch field with Harry's broom where she had risen several hundred feet before balancing on the edge and jumping. Harry had watched from the window in the tower, knowing it was better not to stop her.

_Hermionie and Ron._

Both of who had been with him since the beginning, helping him when no one else did, and who fought when he couldn't. He was slipped poison, and nearly died himself, so when death eaters attacked the school, they rallied everyone, they led the charge, and they died even as they killed the last of the enemy. Bodies could not even be recovered, not that anyone but him was really left to attend a funeral.

_Draco._

The last one to be expected but the one who was eventually with him at the end. Everyone else had been killed, and Draco had stepped forward to give Harry someone to lean on. Every other support had been kicked away by the Dark Lord's uncaring foot, so he replaced them, explaining that he still had a duty to the world, one that he could never abandon. He was with him at the last battle and was killed apathetically by an unknown man.

He lowered his arm again, and apparated.

There was a sharp cliff directly before him now, but the sound of crashing waves echoed to his ears.

The final battle had taken place at the Riddle Mansion, but Harry had not realized that he would fight anything besides Tom. He was wrong. Before he even reached his goal, he had to defeat the hordes of Dark creatures and Death Eaters that were in his way. The duel itself, after he had watched Draco's body falling cold to the ground beside him, was short. Only a few spells and finally a specialized curse that undid Tom's soul, destroying him forever. The spell had taken so much of his energy, and after the others, he had known apparating away, that he would not survive until dawn.

A breeze blew into his face, singing of the ocean.

His eyes flickered closed. _Do I go to heaven for all those I have saved or hell for all those I have killed? Is one better than the other? Both are hell to me now. To see those I killed or to be tortured with their deaths. _

_Over…it is over at last. Never again. No one else can be hurt by me, because they already have been. _

_All I wanted was to help. _

_It's almost ironic isn't it? I'm the boy who lived, and I am live by death. Balance in the universe. There must be suffering to counter the gifts I gave. Nothing can be perfect anymore, but now it is done, and I can do what I want. I deserve that, if nothing else._

He looked over the edge, into the rolling waters.

That is what I want. I want to fly. Something I've never done. I want to fly. Feel the soft whispers of wind trailing beside you as you race nature. The quiet calm, the frantic rush.

His foot slipped on the edge of the cliff.

_This. I want _this_. I want to fly, just once, and I can end in peace. One last flight. _He felt his breathing become more painful. The exertion of the battle had caught him at last. _No. Not yet, I want to fly, this one last time._

Harry leaned forward, and stepped into nothing.

The world whistled around him, a smile broke on a face that had not held one in years.

He flew.


End file.
